


Bullet

by haileyyanneupton



Category: Chicago PD (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-27
Updated: 2020-09-27
Packaged: 2021-03-08 04:02:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,228
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26679427
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/haileyyanneupton/pseuds/haileyyanneupton
Summary: When she gets struck down by a suspect she's been chasing for months, Jay tends to Hailey by the side of the road, causing feelings to bubble up to the surface
Relationships: Jay Halstead & Hailey Upton
Comments: 1
Kudos: 54





	Bullet

There was gunfire coming from every direction, the sound echoing so severely that it left anybody within a mile radius deafened. The smell of gunpowder was overwhelming, and despite the fact that there were much easier targets to go after, Hailey Upton had her eyes fixed on only one. This particular suspect had slipped Detective Upton's grasp one too many times, leaving the woman more determined than ever to put him in cuffs and send him up to Cook County prison. Her determination had left her blind to any other potential dangers — she had tunnel vision, and it was about to catch up with her.

Hailey hadn't even realised she had been shot at first — the adrenaline rushing through her had temporarily stopped her from feeling let alone acknowledging the sharp pain in her side. It was only when the suspect she was chasing shot at her again, her vest catching the bullet, that she was knocked off of her feet, the wind being knocked out of her as she struggled for breath. She knew better than to try and sit up — playing dead was her only chance at survival in that moment — leaving her to close her eyes until she could be certain the suspect had left. After a minute or so, she managed to crawl her way behind a car before collapsing back onto the curb, her sight cloudy as she fought to keep her eyes open and her mind sharp. It was only then that she saw the trail of blood following her — glancing down, she saw that the blood was coming from a gaping wound just above her hip. 

Hailey could only describe the force of a bullet shooting through her being strangely similar to that of a hard punch. The initial impact didn't hurt, but it was when the pain caught up to you that it throbbed, ached, stung and stabbed through your entire body. Hailey found herself seething as she cursed herself for getting shot and not being able to take this suspect down — it had been her fault that he had gotten away the first time, and she couldn’t believe she was letting it happen again. Her heart was pounding; every time she looked down at her hands, there was more and more crimson red blood staining her skin. Her vision blurred and grew dark around the edges as she felt her consciousness begin to slip, only to hear someone call out her name in a strained scream that ran right through to her bones. 

"Hailey!" 

She felt strong arms pull her body into someone's chest, but she didn't have to open her eyes to know who it was. Just like how you never forget the words to your old favourite song, Hailey would never be able to forget the sound of Jay Halstead's voice or the way her body slumped into his. She would never forget the feeling of his hands pressing against her wound to keep her alive, or the way he clutched her so close to his chest as if she could vanish into thin air at any moment. Every second remained frozen in time as she blinked her eyes open to see Jay kneeling over her with droplets of what could have been tears or sweat rolling down his freckled skin, her hand finding his arm before gripping onto it tightly. 

“5021 George, we need an ambulance to our location now!” Never had Hailey ever heard the man sound so panicked. “My partner’s been shot! Officer down — I repeat, officer down!”

Hailey grimacing in pain bought the man’s attention back to her as she tried to pry his hand off of her to take over holding pressure. Jay refused however, either oblivious or choosing to ignore whatever his injured partner was trying to get him to do.

“He’s getting away, Jay,” she managed to force out, her vision growing darker and darker with every waking moment. “You h-have to go —“

“Hailey, there’s no way in hell that I’m leaving you here alone!”

“We’re gonna lose him —“

“I’m not going to lose you, Hailey!”

Silence filled the already tension filled air for a few long seconds as Jay frantically tried to stop Hailey from bleeding out, only to cry out in frustration — nothing he was doing seemed to be working. Hailey wasn’t exactly sure when, but at some point he had stripped her of her vest to allow him to hold more pressure on the wound above her hip before tossing it to the side as he tried to find a balance between putting enough pressure on the wound and not hurting Hailey any further. She looked so small and fragile as her skin slowly drained of all colour and her eyes slipped closed once again— Jay screamed for somebody, anybody to help them. Nobody came. Nobody seemed to even hear him. For the first time, it dawned on him that saving his partner who was lying lifelessly in front of him was entirely up to him. Jay wasn’t one to get scared often, but in that moment? He was absolutely terrified. 

“Hailey, stay here, stay with me,” Jay sobbed, his body shaking as he tried everything to wake Hailey up again. “Come on! Hailey! Goddammit Hailey, this — this isn’t funny anymore! Wake up! Wake up, wake up, wake up!”

He felt like a helpless child. 

When he heard sirens wailing in the background after calling out on his radio at least another three times, he was surprisingly angry. What took them so long? Hailey was laying there, unconscious, and they were taking their sweet time. 

“Did you stop for coffee on the way or something?!” Jay exclaimed, his throat raw from screaming for so long. “Help her!”

Jay felt a hand on his shoulder pulling him away from Hailey’s body as the paramedics whisked her into the back of the ambulance to stabilise her, the same hand helping him stand upright as he rubbed his face anxiously. His heart was pounding and his chest was tight, the man feeling as though the life was being squeezed out with him as he watched them force a mask over his partner’s mouth and nose. A small squeak left his mouth as he furiously wiped his tears off of his cheeks — he hated crying. 

“Hailey. . .” He spoke her name in more of a whisper. “Please! Please be okay!”

Behind him was Kim, who was wearing a stressed expression while being comforted gently by Adam. Vanessa was standing by Kevin with tears in her eyes, but the one standing by him, was Voight. Voight’s eyes usually seemed so cold and distant — but not that day. That day, Hank Voight’s eyes held worry and concern for Hailey as well as sympathy for Jay, who was crumbling worse than he ever had in front of his unit. Everybody watched on, waiting for somebody to say something — that was until a paramedic poked their head out of the back of the Ambulance and looked directly over at the Intelligence unit. 

“Which one of you is coming with us?”

Nobody argued when Jay practically launched himself into the back of the ambulance, nor was anybody surprised. Just because both Jay and Hailey were blind to their attraction to each other, it didn't mean everybody else was too. They could see how infatuated they were with each other, they caught them staring longingly at each other from across the bullpen even when they didn’t realise it. Jay and Hailey had been working up to an exploding romance since the day they met — this was sure to be the tipping point. Jay had gotten hurt on the job so many times, leading Hailey to become a mess every time — this was the first time Hailey had gotten herself into a situation where her life was hanging in the balance. 

It was safe to say that Jay knew how she felt now. 

✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦

The bullet Hailey had been hit by normally wouldn’t have done as much damage as it did, but with the woman not realising she had been shot and continuing to chase after the suspect, the bullet had slowly but surely made it’s way to her pelvis and had come into contact with blood vessels there. The thing about the pelvic area was that when there was a significant trauma to it, there was always a risk that a person could bleed out due to the amount of blood vessels intertwined together. Not only that, but the fact that the pelvic cavity could hold more than the entire amount of circulating blood in a human body meant that the doctors at Chicago Med had to work quickly. 

Will had come in late that morning, yet he knew as soon as he saw his brother being restrained by a couple of nurses and another doctor that something bad had happened. Jay wasn’t one to lose his cool and not be able to bring himself back, so seeing him being basically carried out to the waiting room was a sight that left him sick with worry. His first priority suddenly became his brother and working out what the hell happened — as he approached the man, Will grew more and more concerned as his blood stained clothes became more apparent.

“Jay,” Will placed a hand on his brother’s shoulder as Jay searched around the room frantically for some kind of answer that he wasn’t going to get. “Jay, look at me. What happened? Are you hurt?”

Jay numbly shook his head. He didn’t know how to say anything except her name.

“Hailey.”

“Hailey’s hurt?” Will’s eyes went wide; it was staring to make sense. “What did they tell you?”

“I — She — You. . .”

Jay always had something to say. He always had an opinion, a remark — something — yet at that moment, he was completely and utterly lost for words. His mind had hit a brick wall named Hailey, and until he knew that she was okay, he wasn’t getting past it any time soon. The fact that his brother was standing in front of him with such a panicked expression only panicked Will too, leaving the doctor to walk his dark haired brother into a chair as he caught eye of Voight who was walking in with the rest of the unit hot on his tail. After passing his brother off into the capable hands of his Sergeant, Will headed right into the emergency room to find out what was going on and exactly how bad it really was. 

Hailey had almost coded once when her blood pressure bottomed out, but before she could go into full arrest the doctors had hung a few bags of blood on the rapid transfuser which bought her back enough for them to take her into emergency surgery. It wasn’t easy, but they had managed to remove the bullet and repair the blood vessels in Hailey’s pelvis, leaving her stable enough to head to the ICU while the rest of the blood she had lost was being transfused. Will had done his best to keep Jay updated, but his brother had quite literally lost it when he heard that Hailey had almost gone into cardiac arrest and was being taken up for surgery — it took the strength of not just Adam, but Kevin and Vanessa too to hold him back from running after the surgeons. When Natalie had gotten hurt, Will could remember how painful the not knowing was. Jay was feeling just the same.

As every minute ticked by, the seconds felt like they lasted longer and longer. Jay felt like he was watching people walk in and out of the emergency department faster than it was taking for anyone to give him any news on Hailey, the man about ready to explode. It was only when Will came out with a small smile on his face that Jay felt some of the rope that had been tied around his chest loosen — a smile was a good sign. Right?

“She’s okay, Jay,” Will told him gently. “She’s awake and wants to see you if you’re up for it.”

Jay practically pushed past his brother and towards the elevator on the other side of the emergency department as he impatiently pressed the button that Will had called out as he slipped in beside him. The fact that Hailey was in the ICU scared Jay a little bit, but the fact that she was awake was enough to calm his trembling hands just a little bit. He hated feeling so uneasy and unsteady, as if he could fall to the ground at any point — if this was how Hailey felt every time he had gotten shot, Jay was never leaving the district again.

As he walked into Hailey’s hospital room, his breath was knocked out of his lungs for a split second as he took in her appearance. The pinkish tone she had to her cheeks was coming back and her lips were no longer a pale white, her hair spread messily across the pillow as she opened her blue eyes with a smile. 

“How does it feel to have an uno reverse card pulled on your ass?”

At last, the rope around his chest disintegrated into nothing, Jay finally able to let out a sigh of relief as he smiled gently. If Hailey was making a joke at Jay’s expense, then she was feeling herself. That was all he wanted. 

“I’ll be honest,” Jay sighed lightly, rubbing his face absentmindedly. “Not great.”

Hailey gave a lopsided smirk as Will left the room, giving Jay and Hailey some time alone as Jay took a seat in the chair beside her bed. 

Hailey truly thought that she was going to die when she slipped out of consciousness that last time. She fought for as long as she could, lived on borrowed time that wasn’t her’s to take, but only because in that moment, she realised something that would change everything for her. As she felt herself drifting further and further away, she realised that she wasn’t afraid of death. In fact, death seemed kind of peaceful in comparison to half of the things she had had to deal with in her life. No, what she feared more than anything else was being without Jay because without him, there was no sunshine. There was no happiness. Without Jay, Hailey felt like a giant piece of her was missing and she couldn’t bare feeling that kind of empty for any longer than she already had. There was no way.

By the time Hailey looked back over at Jay, she was shocked to find that he had his head in his hands as his body shook gently in the chair next to her. They were faint, but small sobs could be heard escaping the man’s lips as she felt her heart squeeze in a painfully uncomfortable way — she wanted to make him feel better, but she genuinely had no idea what to do.

“Jay,” Hailey’s voice was soft yet still raspy as she called out to her partner sadly. “I’m okay. I promise I’m okay.”

“You nearly weren’t though,” Jay countered, his tone not nearly as hostile as what part of her had expected it to be. “I was so. . .”

“I know.”

“I thought you. . .”

“I know.”

Jay’s watery eyes found Hailey’s, the sight making her own eyes sting too. Not many people realised or even knew that Hailey was a deeply empathetic person — in order to shield her heart though, she had to put up a cold exterior sometimes to protect herself. She normally had no problem keeping up that exterior, practicing it for so long that it came to her like second nature — that was until she was laying across from her partner, her best friend, watching him fall to pieces. 

In one swift moment, Jay was up on his feet and had wrapped Hailey up in his embrace, her hair absorbing his tears as he held onto her with all of his might. Now that he had her in his arms once again, he couldn’t physically bring himself to let her go — he was petrified that if he did, she would just disappear. Hailey could feel just how fast the man’s heart was beating as she too wrapped her arms around him, only solidifying further just how much of a wreck he truly was.

“I’m sorry for scaring you,” Hailey whispered into her partner’s ear. “I didn’t even realise I got shot, Jay, otherwise I would have called for help earlier. I only came down because he shot me in the chest and my vest caught it, but. . . I guess you already know how hard that can hit you.”

Jay didn’t say anything for a moment, the only sound coming from him being small sniffles as he tried to pull himself together. When he finally did answer, the words that escaped his mouth not only shocked Hailey but frankly, Jay too.

“Hailey,” he started, pulling away from the woman slightly to stare at her properly. “I love you.”

Hailey’s eyes went wide for a moment, taken aback so much she thought that her heart might stop and it would set off the monitors all over again. “Jay —“

“Never mind, I don’t — I don’t know why I said that. I — I’m sorry, I. . .” Jay paused for a moment, staring into blue eyes for a few heartbeats. “Actually, you know what? I’m not sorry. I do love you Hailey. I love you more than I’ve ever loved anybody in this world.”

Butterflies erupted in Hailey’s stomach as she stared, stunned. Little did she know however that Jay was freaking out just as much as she was, feeling as though he was a high schooler asking out his very first girlfriend all over again. He suddenly forgot how words worked and he needed to be reminded what a coherent sentence was. 

“The thought of losing you for good is just — it’s too much. I can’t do it. We aren’t guaranteed tomorrow Hailey — I could walk out of here and get hit by a bus — I’m tired of shoving these feelings away when all I can ever think about is you. When I wake up I wonder if you’re awake too, when I go to sleep I wonder what it would be like to be laying there next to you. I love you, Hailey. I love you, I love you, I love you.”

Hailey’s eyes were wide. “I-I thought it was just me.”

“Are you kidding me, Hailey?” The hint of a smile broke out onto Jay’s lips. “I’ve been obsessed with you since the day you got here.”

Nerves ran through Hailey as she debated her next move, eventually deciding to come right out and do it. Do what she had been waiting years to do. Hailey placed a hand on Jay’s cheek as she gently guided his face closer to hers, connecting her lips to his at last. After a few moments that felt as though they lasted forever, the two of them pulled away, their foreheads brushing lightly as they stared into each other’s eyes longingly.

“I’m sorry, I probably should have let you finish or at least asked before I —“

“Hailey,” Jay breathed out her name, never taking his gaze away from hers. “Don’t you dare stop."


End file.
